Design Team Project – Heart and Roses Earring Holder

by DT member, Ruth

I saw a beautiful wire heart in a shop in December, with clips on to hold Christmas cards. It set me thinking about whether I could make something similar to hold all my dangly earrings, so I’ve created this piece based on that idea for my Design Team project this week. Valentine Hearts and Flowers seem to have had some influence too!

I decided to make a back board for the earring holder and started with this – I had a large piece of chipboard that was already white, but you could use any strong cardboard and give it a coat of acrylic paint to get the base colour.
I cut a heart template from some thin card the same size, drew round it on my thick card and cut it out. (it was easier to do this on thin card as you can either fold it in half to make it symetrical or use the Fiskars Shape Cutter & Hearts Template to help you). Then I coloured the heart with a quick spray of Glimmermist Ink. I stamped on a random rose design from the Fiskars Clear Stamps Mini Sheet – Floral, using a Acrylic block, then I added some colour to the images with some silver and green inks.

I used a wire coat hanger to form the main wire heart shape, twisting the hook around to make a hanging loop. When I was happy with the shape, I wrapped it in blue ribbon, and secured the end with tacky glue and a bit of silver wire.

Next I made the wire loops for the edge of the wire heart.. To do this I wrapped some silver wire around a wooden spoon handle, like a spring. Then I stretched it out slightly and squashed each loop flat. I attached the loops along the side of the heart with some pieces of wire. See photo below..

I then used lengths of wire to wrap across the heart to create the central framework.

I decided to use more wire to attach the framework to the back board, so I used a Fiskar’s Eyelet Setter and Mat to punch holes and set Fiskars eyelets at points around the background. Then I secured the heart to the board through these holes with some short pieces of wire. Finally I tied some spare ribbon in a bow at the top then hung my earrings all over the framework and on the wire loops at the side.

I’m really pleased with this to keep all my earrings on – although it’s hanging on the landing as I haven’t got my resident handyman to hang a hook on the bedroom wall yet!! If you haven’t played with wire before it’s a good project as you only need one reel of wire and, as you won’t be wearing it next to your skin, it can be any quality. I picked up two reels and some wirecutters for £1 from a discount shop – so now I need another project for the spare wire! Any suggestions?